another Sunday...

Once again, a fruitful Sunday. Got a 3-quarter pants for CNY and this shall mark the 1st year of not-wearing-skirt during CNY. Heh. But i don't really like today, cos a Hungarian is an Angarian, and I was being made a Hungarian for almost 3-quarter of a day today. So naturally, I was an Angarian. And I hated it when dad starts shifting furniture abt just cos he wanted to wipe this ceiling or that wall. Who cares abt walls/ceilings getting dusty? Nobody's coming to our house anyway. And even if there is (which has a probability of 0), you think pple will stick out a finger and start touching here and there, up and down, testing how thick a layer of dust in mint collection you have managed to get? What a bother.

Saw Karen at TMall this aftn. Haha, cant help laughing when she couldn't find her family members after stopping a while to chat with me. :)

So happened to stumble upon Alfred Aldehyde's blog. I felt so disgusted after reading some of his entries. How is it possible that there exists a person who brags abt how rich/capable he is, without feeling his face turning red? Perhaps his mum didn't force him to eat humble pies. Or perhaps she didn't even know the recipe. Haha. And of cos, I don't see how proud it is to be exempted from normal NS duties and to be just an admin clerk. Can't he see that he would be considered lesser than his peers who went to some Tekong or dunno-wat camps, in future? Maybe he's too rich to work.

I think Guai Gia #01 will be reading my blog-finally, so I shan't say bad things abt her. Haha, no lah, nth bad abt her to talk too. Happy that she found a job that could entitle her free Internet use...so can chat online while we're working. But seriously, I think she's a worker who's being exploited. Haha, as if her pri sch is a MNC like that. Happy working gal, don't be too stressed ah!


By the way, anyone bought any CNY goodies? I haven't leh...

Mission accomplished

Mission accomplished! Instead of buying a pair of heels, I ended up buying 3 pairs, of which 1 pair's for mum. Went down to Bugis OG. There were lots of shoes there, but I just couldnt find any pair that I liked. No affinity, I should say. Headed to Bedok and found the Mr Right. Shoes, i meant. Nice and tall, very cheap as well, haha. Yeah.

Next on the CNY hunting list would be the skirt and the earrings.

stupid mistakes

Had the longest conversation with 2 colleagues today-Arthur and Mr dunno-who. Heh. I even knew more abt the Big M thru one of the conversations. Somehow maybe I'm still too naive or simply dumb, I made 2 stupid mistakes in my conversations. Not really mistakes, but it just made me feel like slapping myself after the words came out of my mouth. Sigh. Talk abt work, today i almost had nth to do, and yest i almost had too much to do. Whats up? I was surfing the net half the time. And it was a pity my parents didn't want the free JetStar air tix. :( Oh, I also uncovered a pin-hole camera in my office, right behind my desk. Sneaky huh!

Arthur asked if I wanted to go watch PSS2 Fianls cos he may have free tix, cos his nephew was one of the contestants-Cai Weijian! My goodness, one of the few whom I have supported. The others were Lesheng and Charlotte (or was that Michelle?). Though its really unlike me to watch such stuff, but I thot thats a rare chance, why not? Anyway, he may not get the tix afterall.

Tmr is my shoes mission. Hope to get a pair of new heels. Hopefully I may happen to spot some nice skirts too. Haha.

Horrible day?

The horriblest day of the year. Slippers spoilt. Cut my hand. Had a horrible scare. Had work to do from Sam and Arthur. Whats up? Long story. Slippers spoilt, couldn't walk. All the tools that could help was tried, but it still came out. OK Glue, Scotchtape, Big stapler. Useless. I walked barefooted for abt thrice cos my slippers gave way when I halfway up the stairs. The best way out was to take off my slippers. That stupid slipper made me cut my hand. But I 'earned' an early ride home. Haha.

Had a great scare by Sam. He told me to chaneg the company logo on his 52 ppt slides. I did. All of a sudden, I noticed a missing QTRC 21 pix. I thot I deleted it, cos I couldn't rmb if its was originally there or not. Wong came down and asked how I was doing. So I conveniently asked him if he thot a pix was supposed to be there. He said yes. Oh gosh, I nearly fainted. Tried to find the pix from all the files, but to no avail. In the end,I called Sam and told him what happened. He told me he didn't put the pix yet. He asked why I wasn't eating cos it was lunch and told me not to worry cos I can always put my photo there. To think he could still joke when I was so worried here. I was so shocked and worried and anxious that I didnt feel hungry at all. But I felt so relieved that I almost cried. Dunno why, but i'm just so scared. Guess I'm still too young? Anyway, guess I was too worked up before, I actually felt exhausted. Stupid adrenaline overworked my nerve cells and brain cells. Heart muscles as well. When I went up and told Wong abt it, he said that he knew the pix wasn't there actually. Contradiction?

And I don't understand why Arthur's name spells nightmare. I always feel so stressed doing work for him. My mood was spoiled for the whole day. No smile at all. Raymund was so scared to trouble me to call Christine. Henry was afraid to use my PC as well. Big M didn't dare to crap too much. Too bad. Not bad actually.

Good thing was I met 1st sis this morn and I received my 1st salary from MOE for relief teaching! yeah!

Durian episode

Today someone from the company bought durians. The no.1 hated food in my list of hated food. Everybody was like asking me: "Hey Miss, aren't u eating?" And for the 20th time I was saying: "Oh, I don't like durians." I was still wondering if I haven't got a name. Fred came and asked whether I'm a S'porean cos he assumed that all S'poreans LOVE durians. Apparently, I proved him wrong. I felt bad, not showing face, esp when everyone invited me to join them, but I really can't force myself to stain my hands to eat sth that I don't like! Sigh. If only they had bought pizza, which I might still eat though its also in my list of don't-eat food.

The big M took a half-day leave today. Phew! Peace for half a day. I think so far, other than the 2bosses on level 3, the level 2 bosses are still ok.

Someone called me last nite. I should be angry with him for spreading some untrue stuff, but somehow I was 'softened' by his sincerity. But it was nth.

Received the DSTA email/letter today too. Was quite surprised to know that I actually made it thru the Prelim Interview by crapping, but I had a feeling that everyone was shortlisted and it wasn't a big deal. What kind of assessment can last for 3.5h? I don't know. Mystery will unravel on 08 Feb...

Sundays

I love Sundays. Cos I don't have to work, which also implies that I don't have to see that stupid M in the office, and also cos Sundays = Fruitful Days. Guess what, I bought another new shirt today! That means I have 2 tops for the 1st 2 days of CNY already. I'm not gonna let history repeat like last yr, when I couldn't find any nice CNY clothes at the very last min. Haha. still, I lack bottoms, heels and earrings.

Talk abt that stupid M really makes my blood boil! I really cant stand him. The fact that he's got nth to do does not render him eligible to pester me. Pple who know me well know that I get very serious when I'm doing my work and I make absolutely no effort to entertain any jokers who try to disturb me and make me entertain them while I'm doing my stuff. Had it not been my intention to be kind, I would have told him to just get lost and leave me alone. I'm not trying to be rude, but I guess this is what normal gals would do to irritating-&-having-nth-better-to-do guys. Its sad that he's working on the same Saturdays as I am, and this would mean that I have to see him 6 days a week on alternate weeks. I have half a good mind to swop. And its sadder to think that I have to see him again in less than 10 hrs time. My goodness.

Spoke to my SciCo junior just know and learned that there were only 7 new members forthe Chem dept from the new intake. They have yet to categorise them intoresearchand crystal growing, and yet I can foresee that less than 4 will belong to the latter. I understand how Esther really feels-being occupied with planning activities for both the seniors and the juniors. Bad thing abt being the head is that on one hand, the teacher will be telling you to organise activities for these and those, as if they are simple tasks. On the other hand, you have entirely no idea as to what to organise. Worst of all, its hard to get things going abt among ur peers, who don't feel like doing anything, without them feeling that you are ordering them to do sth. So there you have it. All I can do is to tellher to jia you. What can I do? I've been through that and i received no encouragement from my senior. Its very kind of me to offer my moral support. Haha.

All of a sudden, I'm reminded of how lousily I'll do for my A-levels. Sigh, feel like crying. What am I gonna do if I get no As? Nobody understands.

Changing the topic, my mind has been almost pre-occupied with that somebody ever since that some event ended. I don't know how I ended up having good impressions of that somebody when that somebody was just an acquiantance in my life. Somemore, we didn't even know each other well, neither had we spoken to each other for more than an hour in all. I sure hope that soon that somebody will be taken off my mind...

Audition + work

Went to some music company for an audition with XH aft work today. We weren't accepted, neither were we rejected. The producer wanted us to join their singing classes. And of cos, we rejected the 'offer'. Who wants to pay so much $$$ to learn singing at an unheard-of music company, performing at some unheard-of events? Not being a sourgrape here, but I think the main aim of that company is to get pple sign up for their singing classes. We weren't bad, neither are we sad or affected at all, cos we weren't really hopeful and serious in the first place. Life goes on. Haha.

Speaking abt work,there's this stupid uncle who's always so irritating in my office. I don'tknow why he always like to talk to me, perhaps cos I'm new, so its easier to brainwash me with all his "history & philosophy", but pls, I have work to do. Twice today I have been seen talking to him by 3rd floor Crystal. I didn't want to offend him, thats why I patronised him. But that doesn't mean he can talk to me till I can't eat my lunch, can't do my work. All he talks abt-all the time, is

• how capable he is thou he's only a Diploma holder,
• how he's got the trumph card cos he's directly employed by the biggest boss,
• how he's better than some other bosses (who's only a-lvl grads),
• how stupid his workers are,
• how he dislocated his arm 5 yrs ago and have yet to recover,
• how life was when he was still a consultant 18 yrs ago at a major firm,
• how he's been working smart and others have not, blah blah blah.

U think i would be interested? Somemore he speaks so softly, how can I-who's known to be quite deaf, hear him? I was like nodding my head, agreeing with him all the way thou I didn't really cared abt what he said. I couldn't hear him! What can I say? No point disagreeing with him anyway, cos that would only prompt him to say more so as to prove that what you said is WRONG and what he said was RIGHT.

Aside, the funny thing is that there were so many instances whereby i'm so free and have nothing to do AT ALL. Its either i've been too fast with my work (which I'm inclined to believe so, haha) or there's really nothing to be done or there's sth to be done, just that i'm missing them out. I don't know,but I feel like taking leave. So that i have more work to do when I get back and so that I won't have to see that stupid uncle.

1 week of work

My 88th post! What a nice number. Shall make this post a COLOURFUL one. Anyway, 1 week has passed. I don't know whether you call it fast, but I can't wait for Rosie to go and come, so that I can come and go. Haha. But first I'm wondering how I'm gonna survive w/o her for the next 3 mths. Tmr's Rosie's last day. Thou I'm getting used to the work routine, I still don't quite enjoy it, perhaps cos of the pple here. Its not that I don't get along with them, in the first place, this is a mind-your-own-business kinda workplace and there is an obvious age-gap. But anyway, the crux lies with the horrible dose of office politics.

Here goes:

Some of the 2nd floor pple dislike some of the 3rd floor pple and yet some of the 3rd floor pple like to come down and bother some of the 2nd floor pple, when they know that some of the 2nd floor pple don't like them.

When the boss is around, some of the 3rd floor pple suddenly become so busy and start running about the 3rd floor and the 2nd floor while some of the 2nd floor pple laugh at how some of the 3rd floor pple keep themselves seemingly busy.

One of the 3rd floor pple wrote a notice that says: "ISO Auidt-No Leave Allowed" on the 2nd floor whiteboard and some of the 2nd floor pple sneered and commented on that notice. One of the 2nd floor pple circled the wrong spelling and insisted on taking leave on that particular day, cos he said he couldn't understand the notice.

Some of 3rd floor pple like to come down to the 2nd floor and order some of the 2nd floor pple to do some work. Some of the 2nd floor pple entertained them, some made faces behind their backs, some argued with them, some complained when the order-ers left while some acted blur.

Interesting? I think the best way to survive is to...not bother. See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil-in front of all these pple. By the way, guess which floor I belong to?

Rosie says I'll receive big red packets from the bosses during CNY. Best is to bring 2 Mandarin Oranges. But isn't it weird to appear, all of a sudden, in the bosses offices with 2 Mandarin Oranges, waiting for them to give me red packets? How shd I go abt doing that? I still have 1 month to think abt it. Haha. Maybe 1 day I should set a password to this blog. If not my head will roll if my office pple read this blog.

Fruitful day

I don't usually go out on rainy days, but this shopping trip I made with mum this aftn was really fruitful. Got myself a Nike jacket and a nice, new shirt and necklace to go with it. The jacket is supposed to be menswear, but I can't be bothered. I thot it looked great on a female-thats me, and I bought it. Who says gals can't wear guys jacket if it fits? Its $99.90. Haha. Less than $100 for a Nike jacket is a reasonable price. The shirt's from Isetan, just a normal red shirt for CNYSi, but with the necklace,the whole set looks nice. Haha. $13+$5. So I spent a lot, but I guess once in a while should be ok. Now I still lack new shoes, new mini-skirt and a set of new earrings. Gambate!

When I got home, I had nothing better to do, so I took this photo:




This was taken at my neighbours' doorsteps. I bet no one has ever seen as many shoes, other than in shoe shops. Haha. By the way, its not just the many pairs of shoes. Its the many brollys too.

Spot any shoes you like?

Tuition

My 1st tuition session for the yr!!! Haha, I'm the tutor, not the tutee. Taught Sec 2 Chem using my Sec 3 Pure Chem textbook. Huh? No lah, its just Hai Sing Catholic's syllabus. No mistake. Quite ok, except that I thot there were many things that we were supposed to know by the time we started using this textbook, but I forgot that he's only Sec 2. I think 1 less yr of General Sci is really very tough on the students, esp on their foundations. I'll just do my best. Luckily i still have my O-level TYS, so I can give him some practices.

Finallymet up withmy dear friendLam. Hadluch and had a short nice chat over lunch-Jap food. Haha. She bought me my fave-colour pens and also my fave-earrings!!! Thanks so much, Lam, really like them a lot. Haha. Meeting up with long-lost friends really feelgood. Like the other time when I met up with Jie Ling. All of a sudden If eel that ever since I've started working, I really miss the schooling days with all my friends, cos we are all alone in our own workplace. Really hope to meet up with everyone once we all receive our pay and have nice meal. Probably steamboat, so that we can celebrate CNY too. Haha. Looking forward...

On my own

Today-independence day! Haha, what rubbish. Rosie didn't come to work today, soI was on my own. Somehow, I just had endless work to do. to tell the truth, I only had abt 40% confidence in what I was doing. Its considered gd in the sense that its better than no confidence at all. Haha. I hate it when Arthur comes down. Whenever he comes down, it means work. Not that I don't have work to do when he isn't around, but its just that sudden work assigned can be stressful. When I couldn't find things or when something goes wrong, I panicked. But once again, thats only me. Didn't ans much phone calls today, so I guess tmr someone's gonna complain to Rosie abt that. But I can't be bothered cos I won't be there. Heh.

Some small things went wrong today. Don't know what, but its definitely not the case whereby all-went-smoothly. Calling Rosie was my last resort and I was forced to make abt 3 of them. And by the way, I have yet to master the skill of making outgoing calls. Anyway, wait till she sees what I did today. She'd prob flip. Haha. By then my confidence level may descend to 0. You nvr know.

I'm glad that I'm on leave tmr. Till now, I still find the pple there quite weird, and as usual, I don't dig weirdos. I was called up for relief teaching today, but couldn't go. If they call me for again tmr, I'd gladly oblige but that implies I'm not gonna have much sleep. Don't mind thou. I quite like teaching aft being tortured by data entry for 4days. If not, I promise to sleep till 1pm.

First day of work

I don't know why this website is in Chinese but theres no way I can revert it back to English, so I shall leave it alone. Haven't been using computer for a long time and I really mean COMPUTER cos my house is use laptop de. Anyway, 1st day of work is no fun. Many a times, I feel quite lost. And forgetful also, maybe cos I haven't been using my brain for a long time liao. But anyway, I should go bang my head against the wall for thinking that teaching is hard, cos its till now then I know, data entry is even harder. I'm afraid of making mistakes and the things all look so foreign to me. Delivery Orders, Pricing list, Cement, Beams, all sorts of things that I have never seen so often in my life as compared to the textbook stuff.

Now is lunchtime and some pple went out to eat. I didn't know that theres no canteen here. Luckily I so happened to buy a sausage bun this morning, so that was my lunch. Seriously, I'm hungry still. Nvm, diet! Haha. Tmr I shall bring lots of food to eat here. I don't care! So now can slack.

Rosie introduced lots of pple to me just now and frankly speaking, I can't rmb half their names. Haha. Still have 4.5h to go. Sigh. I don't know what I'm gonna do when Rosie isn't here next wk. Think I'll just die. So much unfamiliar work to do.

Teaching is fun-ner.

Relief Teaching + JL

My last day of teaching. Gave them pop spelling and it was both good and bad. Sec 1F(exp) took it seriously thou there were still many getting 0/12 while Sec 2A (NA) was horrible. None took it seriously. It took me less than 10mins to finish marking all 20 scripts. Easy to mark, efficient in marking huh! Haha.

Met JL @ 1430,City Hall. I was so tired that I fell asleep in the train and nearly missed the stop. Went to RafflesCity to meet her, then headed to Suntec City + Carrfour and our beloved museum. It was quite disappointing to see the less-than-10 kinda number of pple. Actually it was logical and expected. The Public Power magnetic wall disappeared. The crowd disappeared. The atmosphere disappeared. The only advantage was that it made taking photos so much easier, cos there were no extras. And it was 1 great chance for us to explore the whole place thoroughly. Haha.

Monday must start work liao, sian.


@ Fountain of Wealth, Suntec


@the Atelier, where we 1st met


us in front of museum entrance


...where HomeMade used to be


Me @ the giant capsicum!


Nice view from the side entrance


Me posing next to a sports car, parked in front of the museum


Main Entrance of National Museum


Aircons along the stairs.........Spiral Staircase


the swinging chandeliers


Singa-Merlion Display


Kurt Wenner display


Look up!


...where it didn't look so deserted during opening festival

Jobs

Woke up very early today, the earliest since A-levels ended, not counting the days in NZ. Went to Springfield Sec to do relief teaching today. I was covering duties for a Chinese teacher, Mdm Wan. I took Sec 2B (N.A), Sec 3E (N.T), Sec 1F (exp) and Sec 5A (N.A). It was very hard to teach cos the students, esp those in N streams, were rude, rowdy, inattentive, having u-name-it, they-have it kinda attitudes. I wasted no time in finishing the stuff, completed 1 topic from the CL textbook for all classes, except for the Sec 5 class, where i completed 2 topics. I couldn't make them do the workbook cos I was only a relief teacher, neither could i do other spelling/work stuff cos the students weren't co-operative. Since they had no other qns, I just moved on. Too bad :)

Lets see. There was a gal from Sec 2B who took my relief pass to the toilet since the start oof the lesson, and came back just before class ended. I sent a prefect to look for her, so she came back and gave me a 'look' and commented tt its only a while tt she excused herself. Very funny. 35mins lesson, missing for 30mins, she had the cheek to tell me its only a while. Sec 3E only had 2 chinese gals. Sec 1F was the most well-behaved as they were only Sec 1 students. Sec 5A was the worst. Students either left when they knew I was only a relief teacher, or they started sleeping, or they started making a fool of themselves. The million-dollar qns was: How old I was. Haha. I was made to read the texts, write out the new words, define the words, form sentences, etc. I wonder who's taking the examinations. What shocked me most was the fact that at the level of Sec 5, there were still so so so many words, which shd be learnt during Pri 6, tt the students didn't know how to pronounce or write. How are they going to cope with O-levels? But thats not my prob if they're not willing to learn.

My class actually ended at 12.35pm today, but I stayed back to wait for any guy, James from tpjc, who's also a relief teacher. Lunched together at nearby coffee shop. And by the way, their canteen food was so-so only.


Heh, relief teacher.


my desk...




me, at my desk, with music, Archie+ hp


the 4 of us

4.30pm had an interview at Sunway Concrete Pdts Pte Ltd. Left home at 4pm, thinking tt there's more than enough time to get there. Who knew tt aft walking for 15min,we still couldn't find the place. In the end, took a cab to that stupid secluded place @ IKEA/Courts area. When I reached there, I felt like going home. The place was like a construction site, with lots of Indian/Thai workers, cement, concrete, scaffolds, etc. Still accepted the job anyway. Data entry and admin work. $1250/mth, with all te benefits, 8.30am-5.30pm, with free shuttle from Tampines MRT. Sad, no more waking up at 11am, no more watching 'Cash is King', no more shopping in the aftn. Sigh.

Rollerskating!

This aftn, I finally learned basic rollerskating. My 1st time, mind you, and I was horribly stressed. After abt 30min, I knew how to walk. But my legs were tired and I was perspiring like crazy, so I stopped. I didn't really fall, but there was once when my sis offered to pull me along and I forgot to bend my knees. And so I began to slide and fall backwards. Luckily my mum was behind me and she caught me and put me to the floor s-l-o-w-l-y and gently. Haha. That was so funny. As usual, I sat on the floor and laughed and refused to get up. Hee. Thou tiring, its quite fun actually. Haha.

Countdown @ Museum

-----------@ Entrance--------------Inside the museum-------

Last nite went counting down at museum. Much more pple than I ever expected, but the crowd slowly faded away once the countown ended. Pple danced, but it was just some pple dancing abt here and there. Pple drank, u could see the caucasians each holding to a bottle of wine and gulping down and down. I spoke to one of the guys, and I could feel his hand sliding down my back. Felt like telling him to keep his hand to himself, but I was wearing the official tag, so I just shut up. Some things i didnt expect of the countdown was loud blaring disco-like DJ music, the smog, the neon lights, the fireworks and the many St Johns medics. Heard that someone fainted yest aftn. I felt like fainting yest when the audience just crowded around me during the Project Bandaloop finale.

I was standing inside the 'blocked off ' area which was a small triangle. Pple just crowded around the triangle, pushing against the straps, pushing against me. I could feel the triangle getting smaller and smaller. I was with The Straits Times photographer and it was quite squeezy. Then when the performer came up, the photographer left. Inside the triangle was Yeow Ann and me as well as the performer. U could have imagined how lack-of-space it was. The performer went down, in came another photographer with his tripod. Now now, 3 pple and 1 big tall tripod with a protruding mic. And there was this Indian guy who constantly contributed to the reducing triangle size. I told him for don't-know-how-many times to move back, but its either he's suffering from memory lapse or he just didn't want to obey my request, it didn't require more than 10 sec for the next reminder to come out of my mouth. I don't understand how YA could tolerate a big size person standing and pushing him half the time. I couldn't, so I was quite frustrated. Then my stupid right eye started to irritate me. I was so tired and so unwell with such limited space and oxygen and an irritating eye. Once loft! ended, pooh! the crowd disappeared, vanished! Pls imagine the speed. I helped YA carried the metal stand to the side, it was so the heavy. It took me 2 hands + some staggering to carry 1 stand and he actually could carry 1 in each hand! I was feeling quite faint already. If he didn't help me, i would have dropped the whole stand on the floor. Haha.

There was bag checking yest and those of age 18 had their hands stamped, so tt they could buy liquor. Neither happended to me, all thanks to being an official there. Haha. Felt so privileged. I saw Miss Anne Goh with 2 other gal friends. The rest were all strangers. But I was still wondering, what on earth made her come down to a museum for a countdown? Cos she's still an educator afterall? Maybe.

The end of 2006 marked the end of my volunteering @ the museum. Come to think of it, I have made so many friends (Jie Ling esp), known so many staff (which includes the staff themselves-YA, Ama, Jac, the security guards, the photographer and even the cleaner!) and I even hugged and shook hands with the performers (Cocoloco, Really Xmas Show, Homemade, Proj Bandaloop). It was really fun thou there were so many instances that I felt so totally lost and felt like stomping off and ticking pple off. I have known the place so inside-out, like where the offices are, where the galleries are, whats in each of the galleries, how u get from one place to another, etc. I even got the chance to introduce the place and highlights to some of the audience last nite! And I think i've learnt a lot. Its definitely an experience not to be forgotten and I kinda miss the place and pple now...but i doubt I'll go back there, unless there's a need to cos I've visited the galleries so many times already, and there won't be anymore special shows at least for the time being. So thats too bad. Haha.